"In order to perfect the treaty and thus bring the naval development of the post-war countries under a benign framework, it is necessary to strictly define and classify capital ships, cruisers, destroyers, as well as submarine and seaplane carriers. In addition, the total tonnage and individual performance of various ships also need to be specifically limited in order to ensure a true balance of naval forces among countries. ”

As the all-important battleship contest came to an end, an issue that was a little less high-profile but no less intense than the former was put on the agenda. After all, the naval powers participating in the meeting now all have a balanced fleet with a complete range of ships, and the performance of these auxiliary ships is undoubtedly directly related to the strength of their overall fleet. In a way, these auxiliary warships will even become the key force that determines the victory or defeat of the sea: whether it is lightning strikes, reconnaissance, or escort, their role is irreplaceable.

"The displacement of the cruiser and the caliber of the main guns should have a noticeable gap with the battleship. As auxiliary ships, their standard displacement should not exceed 10,000 tons, and the caliber of their main guns should not exceed 203 mm, if one of these two restrictions is not met, then the type of battleship should be classified as a battleship, subject to the total tonnage of capital ships allowed to be retained by the previous countries. "The representative of the United States presented his own proposal at the meeting.

Qingying did not object to this expected limitation. In the pre-dreadnought era, armored cruisers equipped with 203 mm guns were the mainstream of the world, although all countries built heavy guns equipped with 234 mm or 254 mm guns and a displacement of more than 14,000 tons, but after all, they were only a minority, and it was difficult to escape the fate of the file in the context of disarmament treaties. The decisive battle cruiser built by Germany was essentially a low-freeboard battleship. And the word cruiser really can't be linked; The German Navy's range of activities extended to all seas of the world, and the battleships' firepower, speed, protection and other indicators increased significantly. Warships in this special era. It can no longer meet the requirements of the decisive battle in the new era.

In addition, the cruiser itself is also a type of ship with low cost performance, and its unit combat effectiveness is not proportional to that of the capital ship: in history, the German Navy's three Hipper-class heavy cruisers, with an average price of nearly 90 million marks, only have a displacement of 14,000 tons and 8 toothpick main guns, and the armor protection is as thin as a cicada's wings, while the cost of the Tirpitz battleship is 181.6 million marks, but twice that of the Hipper-class, but it has a displacement of 42,000 tons and 8 380 mm heavy guns. Its protection is not even better than Hipper. And even the Alaska-class of the United States, which has taken the cruiser to the extreme, has a cost of almost $74 million that is almost the same as a South Dakota-class battleship, and the difference in combat effectiveness between the two is also like mud!

In this case, there is no point in pursuing a larger cruiser. Building such ships bigger and stronger, on the surface, is conducive to improving the strength of the navy, but in fact it is an unwise move to waste resources and money. The only reason why cruisers were built was that the span between battleships and destroyers was so large that an intermediate had to be used to fill the huge gap in firepower, protection, and seamanship. In view of this, Qingying is not prepared to engage in endless wrangling with other countries in this area, but accepts the current low-performance framework. Construction of new types of cruisers within this range.

Taking a step back, accept the 10,000-ton limit for cruisers. It was also a good option for the German Navy. Because from the historical situation, cruisers equipped with 8-inch guns in the navies of various countries can hardly achieve a balance of attack and defense under the limit of 10,000 tons: however, in front of Qingying, this is not an difficult thing to solve at all. The protrusion formed by the reduction of the width of the water was created by the guò, the addition of a stern plate at the square tail using the results of later fluid studies, and a bulbous bow that increased the length of the ship on flat ground while increasing the speed and seaworthiness...... And so on, the piles and piles are all big plug-ins that people can't look at directly. Add to that the quadruple turret technology obtained from the French, and an absolutely anti-heaven power system, and it's no slouch to create a treaty cruiser with a balanced offense and defense!

Since Germany did not dispute this issue, the performance ceiling of the new cruiser was thus determined. The standard displacement of 2,000 tons and the caliber of 130 mm main guns will become the upper limit of the performance of the newly started destroyers of the naval powers of various countries in the future. As for submarines, since Germany's latest U127 class already has a water displacement of 1,220 tons, the upper limit of its single tonnage has been relaxed to 1,300 tons, and the caliber of its guns is limited to 130 mm.

After the conclusion of this trivial division of criteria, the delegates suddenly threw themselves into the total tonnage reservation that was foaming at the mouth. If the previous performance limit was a friendly negotiation between countries to cater to their own industrial systems, now it is not inferior to the fierce competition during the previous capital ship negotiations. Germany demanded that cruisers be divided according to the previous proportion of the tonnage of capital ships, but all countries except Austria-Hungary objected: the British pointed out that the Amsterdam Peace Agreement on Anglo-German naval forces applied only to capital ships and submarines, and that auxiliary ships, including cruisers and destroyers, were not restricted; Britain, with its colonies all over the world, undoubtedly needed a large number of cruisers for peaceful cruises.

The United States, Japan, and Italy are also not satisfied with the share of capital ships they have obtained at present, and are counting on the possibility of winning back a city on the cruiser, which makes the negotiations fall into a quarrel again, which is almost endless. Seeing that all parties were at loggerheads, Qing Ying finally put forward a compromise opinion: since there was a large gap between destroyers and cruisers, it was necessary to divide the cruisers into two categories: 10,000-ton heavy cruisers equipped with 203-mm guns, and 6,500-ton light cruisers equipped with 152-mm guns; If there is any disagreement with the scheme of dividing the tonnage of cruisers according to the proportion of capital ships, then light cruisers are built in a certain proportion until the desired tonnage is reached.

This was strongly embraced by the United Kingdom. At present, they are struggling to find enough tonnage to meet their needs for colonial cruises, and the Germans have a strategy to solve the problem. Compared with the 10,000-ton heavy cruiser, the 6,500-ton cruiser can also meet the cruising requirements, and the price is bound to be lower than the 10,000-ton cruiser. The most important thing is that this kind of ship will not be built by Britain alone, but all countries will invest tonnage in this field, which will make the new cruisers built by Britain not have the embarrassing situation of being only a small boat and a small cannon.

After some internal meetings, the delegates agreed to the German Government's proposal: after all, the other side no longer insisted on its absolute superiority in the field of cruisers, and it did seem that an intermediate ship was needed between the 10,000-ton cruiser and the small destroyer to fill the vacancy. Negotiations between the parties were then back on track. Looking at the countries that responded enthusiastically, Qingying couldn't help but smile smugly again: he had just dug a hole at the negotiation table, and these countries couldn't wait to jump in.

Historically, the difference between light and heavy cruisers was that the London Naval Treaty was not calibrated until 1930: before that, countries were taking advantage of the previous Washington Treaty to build 10,000-ton heavy cruisers on a large scale. However, this did not prevent Qing Yingxian from proposing the concept of a light cruiser equipped with 152 mm guns, using an excavator to dig a hole for various countries to jump. Because compared to the heavy patrol equipped with a 203 mm main gun, the combat effectiveness of the light patrol is simply unbearable to look at directly, and creating this kind of thing is almost a massive waste of taxpayers' money.

At present, the British and German navies have a large number of light cruisers equipped with 6-inch guns, and the United States is also planning to build an Omaha class equipped with 12 152-mm guns; However, this was the product of the specific era of the First World War. Because the sophisticated, heavy, and expensive fire control system was only equipped with the capital ship, the light cruiser with only simple ranging equipment had no more than 5,000 meters of combat distance in previous naval battles. However, with the rapid development of fire control technology, these instruments, which originally belonged only to capital ships, also had the opportunity to equip cruisers; The direct consequence of this was a rapid leap in the distance between the cruisers.

In this case, the 6-inch class of guns was far from meeting the needs of future engagements between cruisers. Because according to physics, when a gun of this caliber flies out of 10 kilometers, its accuracy dispersion and armor-piercing power will be sharply attenuated; Beyond 15 kilometers, it is almost out of the effective range, and it is difficult to have substantive significance except to boost the morale of one's own side. And this was not the case with guns of the 8-inch class. At a distance of 15 kilometers, it still has a stable trajectory and strong penetration, and even at a distance of 20 kilometers, it still has a certain range of deterrence. In other words, the heavy patrol can effectively destroy the light patrol at a long distance, and the threat to itself is extremely small; Even if the light patrol closes the distance at full speed, the high speed of the heavy patrol itself can also ensure that the idea of allowing the opponent to exert the projection amount is in vain.

In view of this, Qingying would never let the German Navy create such a seemingly beautiful but lackluster thing. Even cruising colonies should be carried out by heavy cruisers. (To be continued......)

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